Urban Village
Urban Affairs Dean Has Lesson Plan for Cleveland
by Lee Chilcote
Mark Rosentraub, the Dean of the College of Urban Affairs at Cleveland State University, likes to say he’s helping to create “a Greenwich Village between Cleveland State and Case Western.” A lofty goal, perhaps, but he should know; his accent betrays his Big Apple roots. Rosentraub came to Cleveland a few years ago to head up the highly regarded college. An academic expert in the role of sports in urban economic development and an avid sports fan, Rosentraub is diving into both college basketball and Cleveland politics. This week he'll be moderating the Spirit of Immigration Series panel discussion exploring the history, impediments and potential of immigration as an economic engine for Northeast Ohio Tue 5/25 6:30PM-9PM at Cuyahoga Community College-Eastern Campus, 4250 Richmond Road.
Despite the chatter about “brain drain,” the College of Urban Affairs – ranked # 2 by U.S. News and World Report for its grad programs in city management – consistently attracts young people from across the region, and many choose to stay on after graduation. Like the Cleveland Marshall College of Law across the street, the college is working on cornering the market with its high profile grads; Jane Campbell and City Planning Director Chris Ronayne are some of their more notable graduates. From its perch in a shiny new building on Euclid, at the edge of Playhouse Square and Midtown, the college has dipped its finger into most policy discussions around town – lakefront planning, downtown housing, convention centers.
Recently, Cool Cleveland caught up with Rosentraub to talk with him about whether stadiums and convention centers are worth the public dollar, whether Euclid Avenue will look less like Soviet Russia and more like Greenwich Village anytime soon, and his vision for the college and the city.
Cool Cleveland: What brought you to Cleveland a few years ago to head up the College of Urban Affairs? Mark Rosentraub: I had been Associate Dean of the College of Public and Environmental Affairs at Indiana University. I knew the College of Urban Affairs well, because I knew the faculty. I was asked to apply, so I did; I was attracted to the fact that it’s a single-purpose college focused on urban issues and development, and that it’s integrally woven into the fabric of policy-making in the region. I also liked it because it has support at many levels – from Sam Miller of Forest City to the neighborhood organizations. Some people have come to know the college because of the leadership programs, which under Phil Starr have trained 500-600 people. Some people know it because of Norm Krumholz, who headed up the Center for Neighborhood Development and helped to create the community development corporations that exist throughout the city. Others know the college as a teaching and educational resource. I wanted to be a part of this group of people who are committed to urban education.
It’s interesting that we have a prestigious College of Urban Affairs in Northeast Ohio – a region with a distressed city trying to remake itself. How do you see the linkage between the College of Urban Affairs and the success of the region?
I see us pushing economic development. What people need to realize is that we can’t bring Cleveland back to the kind of city that it used to be, because that city doesn’t exist anymore. Changes in transportation and labor costs have fundamentally redefined urban space. The downtowns of the future will be unlike what they were 30 years ago. The new downtown is a neighborhood where people live, a place where arts, culture and entertainment thrive. It’s a place where office space is being transformed into residential space, where sports stadiums are becoming a part of the redevelopment mix. So we have to understand that Cleveland is not alone, that the hollowing out of downtown is as pronounced in New York City as it is in Cleveland. This is a part of the changing role of center cities in America. Successful cities are building urban neighborhoods.
One of your own areas of expertise is sports as an engine for urban redevelopment. What do you think about the building of stadiums and arenas as an economic development strategy? Has it resulted in a net gain or loss for Cleveland?
The stadiums have definitely been worth it for Cleveland. Through making this public investment, the city has been able to reap additional taxes and come out ahead. There were very high levels of private sector investment around the stadiums during the 1990s, at a time when the economy was decentralizing, and this was good for Cleveland. At the county level, the results may be different. But keep in mind that the stadium deals were negotiated in the late 80s, at a time when cities were largely being abandoned. At that time, the head of the baseball league made a series of bombastic statements that unless Cleveland built a new stadium, the Indians could be moved. Today, that conversation would take place differently. There was also a commitment by the owner, Dick Jacobs, to field a competitive team – to take the extra money and put it into the players. That parallel commitment from the owner made the difference, and the Indians had the best record in the American League under his ownership.
What is your vision for the college? What would you like to accomplish while you’re here?
The college just completed an assessment, and we came up with our goals. First, we need to have a more visible role in daily policy conversations about Cleveland. We’ve worked hard to have a larger number of public forums about issues in our region; the new building, with its atrium, was designed to permit those conversations and to raise the profile of the college. As a part of this, we’ve re-structured the college into twelve research centers that play a role in Northeast Ohio’s redevelopment; there is not a policy issue or topic for which someone from the college is not a resource.
Second, we need to increase the philanthropic commitment from the community. Our success is dependent upon support from the state, but with declining support, we need to find other sources of revenue. Our new building was possible in part due to the support of Maxine Goodman Levin, whose generosity also helped to found the College. The Ratner, Miller and Shafran families are helping to fund a research center on immigration, to study ways to bring immigrants to Northeast Ohio to redevelop our economy. Finally, we need to develop a student-centered approach to learning. We need to earn our great reputation every year through good teaching. We need to create more scholarship support for students, more graduate assistant positions. The compound effect of tuition increases exceeds twenty-five percent, and as tuition goes up, there’s always going to be some student at the margin that doesn’t get the chance to go to college or grad school.
This year the College published a book on its history. The college was started in the late 70s when Cleveland was teetering on the brink. Why did you publish the book, and did it reveal anything different about the history of the college or the city?
It’s always good for an organization to understand where it came from; it gives you a better sense of where you ought to be going. The book has also preserved contributions from people like Tom Campbell, Roberta Steinbacher, David Sweet and Jane Campbell. They worked diligently to create a different role for the Levin College – a place that is committed to communities and neighborhoods. There’s also a lot in the book about Maxine Goodman Levin, a woman that basically adopted a college, and Ruth Ratner Miller, who came up with many of the ideas that we still execute today. That’s why you publish a history – to capture the singular events that tie together in order to create an institution. It’s amazing to see the names of the people that wandered into the college’s history. Sort of like the Hotel California – they wandered in, but could never leave! The college has been given the charge of having a social conscience by its founders, and this is one of the hardest things for us to live up to, because when you have a social conscience, you have to bring up difficult issues. People like Tom Campbell brought a constructive dissonance to the dialogue about urban issues; that dissonance is critical.
At that time, cities across the country were emptying out. I imagine the college went against the grain at the time.
Tom Campbell always went against the grain! But the grain was much better for it.
Some would say that the College is a gem in a mediocre university. What do we need to do to make Cleveland State a university that helps to foster some of the economic development we’ve been talking about?
Well, I’m not going to complain about being called a gem! Every great city has to have a great public university, and we do have a ways to go. Northeast Ohio’s economy will not thrive without it. Look at New York as an example. The city committed itself to New York University when its image was declining; now that university is thriving. New York also committed itself to a great urban college in every one of its boroughs. Cleveland State will never be as selective as Berkeley. The question becomes, how do we open the doors a bit wider, allowing more students access, while still having a demanding program? One answer is to build a great honors program, which is something we’re working on.
Last year, the Ohio General Assembly cut funding for higher education again. How do we convince that funding colleges and universities is important?
Unfortunately, I don’t see the level of funding from the state changing anytime soon, so we’re focusing our efforts on building our local funding resources. I’d like to take our state legislators on a tour, and show them what we’re doing at the College, what we’re doing in Northeast Ohio. The fact is that our state is dominated by legislators that represent rural and suburban areas. As a result, a part of the leadership in this conversation has to come from Ohio State University, because they run the agricultural programs throughout the state. Because these interests prevail in the legislature, OSU has an opportunity to influence the conversation about higher education. At the moment, OSU seems more captured by the legislature, than capturing them!
There’s been a lot written about “brain drain.” Yet many of your students stay here and climb the ranks to leadership positions in the city. How are you preparing them?
About two-thirds of our graduates stay in the region. Our goal is to give students a world-class education. We have students going into all three sectors, public, private and non-profit, and we have to remain competitive. One of the things we’ve done is to put together a series of advisory boards with local leaders, so that they can tell us what they look for in employees. This helps us to gear programs towards the needs of the real world.
I’m fascinated by the fact that the college, which offers a master’s degree in Urban Planning, sits on a stretch of Euclid that is a victim of poor planning and development. What’s going on with the university master plan? Is the college playing a role in this?
I don’t know if it’s bad planning, or if we’re just surrounded by economic obsolescence. We’re working closely with the Playhouse Square Development Corporation, and one of our professors, “Roby” Simons, played a key role in putting together the university’s master plan. We want to create new housing that attracts students to live on campus. The lofts at 1900 Euclid Avenue are one recent development, and Fenn Tower is going to be converted into housing, too.
What lies ahead for you and the college in 2004?
There are several initiatives we’re working on right now. We’re trying to develop new programs with foreign universities that will bring large numbers of foreign students to the college to study. The Ruth Ratner Miller Center is studying the role of immigration in economic development. These are programs that will help to bring enrollment and money into the College and the city. We’re also working on development plans with Playhouse Square to complement the Euclid Corridor project. Finally, we’re trying to help the city sort through some key issues, including downtown housing, lakefront planning and the convention center. The current convention center is obsolete, and just like an eighty year old house, it can’t always compete in the modern market. So, we’re working with the city to help them develop plans to tackle these issues. (:divend:)